The invention relates to the removal of a food product from a casing in which the product is formed or cooked and, more specifically, to a method and apparatus for gripping the casing by an end clip to facilitate the separation of the casing from the product.
Many food products are formed by placing a flowable batter or mixture in a large casing, placing the casing in a mold that gives the product a desired shape, cooking or otherwise setting the product so that it will retain the desired shape, and subsequently removing the casing. Examples include processed meat products formed from chopped or otherwise processed meat and other ingredients such as salt, water and spices. In some such products the mold has generally flat ends that are perpendicular to the longitudinal axis of the product, i.e., square ends. The ends of the casing are often secured with clips. The clips may become embedded in the ends of the product while the product is being cooked, particularly where the ends are flat, which may impede efforts to remove the casing. The term “sausage” is used broadly herein to denote products comprising a filling disposed in a casing.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,080,055, to Leining, et al., entitled “Method and Apparatus for Stripping Casings from Sausages,” describes a method of removing casings from round sausage sticks having hemispherical ends wherein the sticks are indexed sideways into a machine. In this method, the casing is inflated prior to removal.
There remains a need for an improved, automated method and apparatus for removing casings from food products.